Little did Dr. Curtis Bullock know when he started spray-painting in 2019 that he would quickly change into probably the most sought-after bike painters within the trade. Higher generally known as @savethepostalservice, Bullock’s spectacular clientele consists of notable cyclists like Andy Schleck and Ayesha McGowan, alongside manufacturers akin to Specialised, Vitus, State Bicycle Co., Chris King, Goodr and Miir.
Bullock’s daring and colour-popping work has garnered excessive demand but regardless of his fast success, he stays modest, referring to himself as “only a man in my storage enjoying with spray paint.”
Biking Weekly visited Bullock at his Portland, Oregon house to learn how this former highschool principal reworked right into a celebrated bike painter and to discover the inspirations behind his eye-catching designs.
Save the Postal Service
(Picture credit score: Specialised)
Reflecting on his journey, Bullock tells Biking Weekly that he was “all the time making issues.” Pottery, sketches, buildings, work – his fingers not often sat idle, but his first endeavour in promoting his creations was a self-proclaimed flop.
Whereas working as a highschool trainer on the time, Bullock launched his @savethepostalservice Instagram account in 2018, focusing –because the identify may recommend– on mail and his handmade envelopes and stationery.
“I used to be taking books with actually nice colors and high quality paper and I might take them aside and make envelopes and letters,” Bullock explains. “Everybody loves getting mail, proper? It’s good and I actually made hundreds of envelopes however nobody was .”
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Whereas his gross sales had been minimal, the expertise in establishing the social media account and accompanying e-commerce web site would quickly show useful.
In 2020, Bullock painted his first bike: a Lemond Poprad disc he’d purchased particularly to color. He was instantly taken with the method and extra creations rapidly adopted, delighting his rising variety of followers.
(Picture credit score: Dr Curtis Bullock)
“One of many issues I feel that folks responded to is that I am only a man in a storage,” Bullock says. “For a very long time I actually resisted utilizing a vinyl cutter or different extra superior instruments as a result of I wished my course of to be one thing others can do, too. I painted these bikes utilizing spray paint, a paper cutter, painter’s tape, some scissors and a few vinyl I purchased on-line. That’s it.”
“And that is positively the trainer in me, you realize, the lesson being: do not simply sit there being amazed by what I do, you can also do that your self.”
However as a trainer, Bullock couldn’t afford to maintain shopping for bike frames. And so he took inspiration from New York artist Wizard Cranium, who reportedly painted on McDonald’s wrappers when he couldn’t afford artwork provides. His recommendation? ‘Paint on one thing, something.’
Curtis Bullock painted Miir mugs
(Picture credit score: Dr. Curtis Bullock)
And so Bullock made journeys to his native thrift retailer, bringing house water bottles, espresso mugs and anything with shapes and curvature just like that of motorbike tubing.
Bullock notably favoured Miir’s camp mugs and bought them in bulk. These mugs offered an inexpensive canvas for Bullock to hone his model and inventive expertise, and he reinvested any earnings from their gross sales again into artwork provides.
Legos and Pee Wee’s Playhouse
Ayesha McGowan’s Liv Langma bike frames painted by Curtis Bullock
(Picture credit score: Dr. Curtis Bullock)
When requested about his distinctive shiny, colour-blocking, Keith Haring-meets-Pop-Artwork model, Bullock factors to his childhood and the first colored bricks of Lego.
“To the exclusion of each different toy. Lego is the one factor I ever performed with once I was a child,” Bullock says.“[My generation] was the primary to have Lego. Whereas the plastic from the Seventies would change into brittle and light, Legos stay completely vibrant. So Lego and the color of that plastic is unquestionably an enormous a part of the inspiration.”
The opposite half? Pee Wee’s playhouse and its whimsical and eclectic inside bursting with shiny, daring colors and fantastical parts.
The web was taken with Bullock’s model and his work rapidly gained traction. The Miir mugs offered properly whereas requests for {custom} bike paint jobs got here in from followers across the globe.
In 2022, Bullock determined to give up his place as college principal on the Sabin-Schellenberg Skilled Technical Middle to complete his PhD adopted by a well-earned break from his profession endeavours to pursue his artwork. Fueled by clientele all around the world, Bullock launched into his first worldwide paint tour in January 2023. He’s been on three extra excursions since, portray bike frames throughout Europe.
All the pieces comes again to bikes
Rane Roatta’s Cannondale Topstone Lefty as raced within the 2022 UCI World Gravel Championships
(Picture credit score: Dr Curtis Bullock)
When requested about his connection to bikes, Bullock replied that all the pieces in his life could be traced again to bikes.
After a childhood spent pedalling across the neighbourhood, Bullock rediscovered bikes as a type of transportation whereas learning on the College of Maryland. Reconnected with the enjoyment of being on two wheels, commuting changed into mountain biking which led to group rides, working at a motorbike store and, even, a welding course at Oregon’s United Bicycle Institute.
Though the lifetime of a motorbike welder wasn’t for him, bikes stay a steadfast presence in his life.
“What I want out of bikes has positively modified over time,” he displays. “After I was educating, [my job] was so stimulating that I truly by no means rode with different folks as a result of I simply wanted to be alone. Now it is nearly the other, the place with the ability to be extra social with folks on bikes is very nice.”
After which, after all, there’s his artwork. Although more and more drawn to shapes apart from a motorbike body –his newest creations, for instance, embrace watering cans and a sequence of Ikea lamps– Bullock hopes for bike trade collaborations the place his designs could be reproduced in scale. Proper now, every bit Bullock creates is splendidly distinctive but additionally tremendously time-consuming.
He meticulously maps out every colour-block and design component in a pocket book earlier than painstakingly slicing dozens of laser decals and portray every part layer by layer by layer.
Bullock admits that typically the method takes so lengthy that even he’s excited when it’s time to disclose the ultimate end result.
“One of many issues I get pleasure from so much is that despite the fact that I’ve the map of the mission, by the point I truly unwrap it, I very steadily truly do not keep in mind what’s below there,” he says with amusing. “By the tip, it is a shock to me, too.”
Whereas he’ll by no means cease creating authentic items, Bullock goals of scaling up his work, collaborating with industrial and inside designers, and in the end being a full-time artist residing in Italy – a dream he’s working to make a actuality. “Only some hundred extra bike paint jobs to go,” he jokes.
Need a piece of rideable Curtis Bullock artwork of your individual?
(Picture credit score: Dr. Curtis Bullock)
Bullock’s paintjobs are wildly intricate and laborious, so be ready to be affected person and shell out $2,200 – $2500 per bike body.
Within the meantime, his Columbus gravel “get together forks”, lamps and mugs are on the market on Shopify wesbite, whereas Portland-based bikeshop CyclePath has a set of custom-painted Enve seatposts and stems on provide.
